


Wisp

by GigglesAndFreckles



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Gabriel is not very sneaky, Speculation, Spoilers for Episode: s05e19 Hammer of the Gods
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-16
Updated: 2014-03-16
Packaged: 2018-01-15 21:43:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,035
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1320244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GigglesAndFreckles/pseuds/GigglesAndFreckles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eternity can seem so meaningless at times.</p>
<p>Gabriel comes to understand a few things throughout his long life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wisp

**Author's Note:**

> This had been bugging me for a while. I wrote it pretty fast and published it, because I just needed to get it out. Gabriel makes my soul cry, and this is that manifested. I hope you enjoy it.

Eternity can seem so meaningless at times. 

Not all the time, of course, because eternity is all there has ever been, and surely that has to be important, right? Angels convinced themselves of this. They never questioned it. They couldn’t question it. 

If you take away eternity, what’s left? 

Gabriel had always pondered that question. When angels Fell to Earth, they ripped away everything that they knew. They left behind everything that was true. The solid world of Heaven turned to nothing and they became humans. Weak and indecisive humans. All they did was shout into the dark and hope it solved their problems. 

But then of course, Gabriel grew up. He wasn’t a fledgling anymore. 

Humanity lost that film of filth he’d always seen it through. Instead of looking indecisive they look free. They weren’t weak, they were the strongest creatures his father had ever created. Their shouts into the dark streaked across space and settled amongst suns and moons before fading into strand of thought that proved humanity was still there. 

Gabriel couldn’t help loving humanity.

When his siblings moved from their original objective, when God left his opulent throne, Gabriel stayed as long as he could. He vainly hoped he could pull everything back together. After all, he was an archangel. Wasn’t that his job? 

He tried to stay. 

Oh, he tried. 

But nothing was the same after Michael cast out Lucifer. There was dissent everywhere he turned. And after Father left, well, it wasn’t going to get any better. 

Gabriel could take a lot of things. But he couldn’t watch his brothers tear each other apart. 

So he left. He got a new name, a new face. He picked the body of a peasant in need and he hid. For years he hid. 

He was so tired of hiding. 

Eternity was slipping from him. He’d been away too long. Humanity looked bleak again, nothing but pawns to play with. 

Then he met them. His favorite playthings. 

Gabriel screwed with them, the way he screwed with everyone. But there was something different. 

He….cared this time. He wanted to help these poor hunters that had stumbled into his path. 

Dean Winchester was a crass bastard. Smart as hell, under his manly man exterior, but mostly just annoying. Gabriel had too much fun with him. 

Sam Winchester wasn’t so bad. He was the loyal little brother who just wanted to see everything end without excess bloodshed, and Gabriel understood that.

And if he respected them both a bit at the same time, well that was no one’s business but his.

He met Castiel, he got to know the brothers Winchester, and Gabriel felt like he was part of something again. There was finally a clear objective. 

Finishing what his brothers had started. 

He didn't miss eternity anymore. It was useless to him, meaningless. All Gabriel needed were these people who stood by him and gave him purpose. 

He needed Sam's dopey grin and Dean's weird stance and Castiel's minimal understanding about most things. He needed a family again. They wouldn't accept him as family, he knew that, he was a stranger. But it didn't hurt to have idle musings, did it? 

Maybe it did. Gabriel got distracted, and he got sloppy. 

After being away for so long, Gabriel had forgotten a few things. He forgot how being in the presence of another archangels brought eternity back to him, reminded him of everything that had ever transpired and of his role in history. 

Gabriel also forgot how he had always failed to sneak up on Lucifer. 

Even when they were both kids goofing around, Gabriel could never take his older brother off guard. Whether they were in a desert, a forest, the bottom of the ocean, or in front of the pearly gates themselves, Lucifer always turned over his shoulder and grinned right as Gabriel thought he had him that time. 

Just as eternity returned, it left him with one stab of an angel blade. 

It hurt more than anything Gabriel had ever known. 

The loyal little brother, dying at the hand of his older brother, his old playmate, the one who had explored the whole universe at his side. 

His grace was exploding. It pulled at his vessel and screamed where it tore. Gabriel know knew what it felt like to Fall. 

He felt like he had just left the nest again, afraid of the world that lay before him and so very alone. 

But he wasn’t alone now. He was amongst the stars. 

He was closer to God than he had been in millennia, he could feel it. So Gabriel did something he hadn’t done in a very long time. 

He prayed. 

“Dear Father, please help me. I know I haven’t been the most obedient or the best behaved angel in the past, but their going to do it, Father. They’re going to burn the whole planet and all the people on it. The only opposition in a rogue soldier and a handful of hunters. If you could just send me back, if you could just let me end this…” Gabriel sighed. 

“Dad, I’m begging you. They need me down there. I finally found a way to help and I was stupid. I screwed up, I tried to sneak up on Lucifer….I was stupid. Please, just...please.” 

Nothing happened. It dawned on Gabriel that nothing would ever happen. He would be stuck in the sea of celestial bodies forever, powerless to save anything. 

Castiel would have to find a way to overpower Heaven without him. Dean and Sam would have to jump the obstacles that would plague them for the rest of their lives without him. 

Castiel would have to understand everything without Gabriel telepathically explaining it. Dean would get to stand around without Gabriel silently laughing. Sam would have to smile when Gabriel wasn't the one who caused it, secretly popping in just to talk to the younger hunter because he was the best company Gabriel had ever known.

Heaven and Hell would continue without him.

The Earth would keep turning without him. 

Humanity would go on without him.

Surrounded by his eternity, Gabriel was nothing more than a wisp.


End file.
